Citizenship and Immigration Committee on April 30th, 2012

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Richmond Hill, ON]

No, where do they make their asylum claims from in Africa?

[Les Linklater]

Where do they make their claims?

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Richmond Hill, ON]

Yes.

[Les Linklater]

It can vary. France receives an exceptional number of claimants from Africa, as does Spain and Greece, particularly with the Arab Spring.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Richmond Hill, ON]

I gather that a lot of them end up coming here?

[Les Linklater]

Some do. Europe is a big transit site for claimants from Africa.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Richmond Hill, ON]

Under the current system, how many people using every level of appeal available are still determined not to be refugees? That's clogging the system, isn't it?

[Les Linklater]

There are a number of appeals available. A person can seek leave to appeal a negative decision to the federal court. There's also the pre-removal risk assessment, and individuals can apply for humanitarian and compassionate consideration if all other avenues fail for them. I don't think we have exact statistics on the number of individuals who try each and every one of those avenues of appeal. We could certainly provide what information we have to the clerk.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you.

Ms. Sims.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Thank you very much, and my thanks to you both for your presentations.

I wanted to start off with a question you heard me ask the minister the other day. It wasn't too long ago—I don't think the ink has dried on C-11 yet—that the great Canadian compromise was reached, and all parties said how wonderful it was.

How long have you actually been working with the new rules created by C-11?

[Les Linklater]

The transition provisions for C-11 differed for a number of elements within the legislation. There were a couple of provisions that came into force at royal assent, including the way we assessed humanitarian and compassionate applications. There were some operational changes that came as a result of that in June 2011. The bulk of the transition measures were to come into force no later than two years after the date of royal assent, that is, by June 29, 2012. We have been working towards that implementation date. A number of packages of regulations were prepublished last summer. As we got into broader implementation issues, the minister was of the view that we needed to look at further legislative reform. At this point there are very few actual provisions from C-11 that have come into force.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

One of the things that was bothering me after the last session was that I hadn't asked about implementation. Here we are now going through a major overhaul when we haven't even implemented what was agreed to by all parties and seen what kind of effect it would have on the system.

At the meeting, Minister Kenney suggested that immigration detention at CBSA facilities is not damaging. He made it sound as if detention centres were quite nice places. I can't imagine the word “detention” being used together with “nice place”. How many CBSA detention spots are there in the country right now? Are the facilities generally operating well below capacity or are they over their capacities? Where will the detainees be going once all those spots are filled up?

[Les Linklater]

I'll ask Mr. Hill from the CBSA to respond.

[Peter Hill]

The CBSA administers three detention centres. The one in Vancouver is at the Vancouver airport. It's very short-term and there are 24 beds for less than 72 hours' use. In Toronto, the immigration holding centre has a capacity of about 220 beds. In Montreal and Laval, we have a holding centre with a capacity of about 150 beds. In addition, we rely on the provinces to detain high-risk cases and other cases where CBSA does not have holding facilities. For the past couple of years, the daily maximum has ranged from 400 to 500 detainees using the provincial and CBSA detention facilities.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Thank you.

So at any time, even with the current system, where we're not going to be detaining as many as we will under the new legislation, we not only have, let's say, roughly 394 spots—my math isn't always perfect, but I think that's pretty close—but we're going well over that, and people are actually going into prisons to be detained.

Now where do the children go?

[Peter Hill]

We have capacity for 400 to 500, so we have sufficient capacity to manage that caseload. When they're in a provincial prison, they are held under terms and conditions that respect international norms for immigration detention. So it's important to point out that they're housed in a provincial facility, but they're housed and managed in accordance with immigration detention rules and norms that the UNHCR, for example, administers and monitors. So we adhere to those.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

When I'm looking at the cost of keeping somebody in detention—please indulge me here—I know the costs of keeping somebody in prison who's been convicted of a criminal record are fairly high on a daily basis. Do you have an idea of what the cost is of keeping somebody in detention and provincial prisons?

[Peter Hill]

Certainly we do and we monitor costs very closely.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

So what is the daily cost?

[Peter Hill]

The daily cost averages between $200 and $230 a day. Those costs actually are rising. We're seeing an increase in costs. In particular, under our arrangements with the provinces, the costs are gradually rising now to a point of about $230 per day.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

What about when they're in prison? What's the cost then?

[Peter Hill]

In prison the rates are comparable.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Do you get a cut rate, then?

[Peter Hill]

We don't get a cut rate.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Okay, I just wondered, because that amazes me how low that is. When I've looked at the cost of detentions for anybody else going into detention, it's much higher than $230 a day. Anyway, I'll leave it at that for that question.

Also, when we—